


Hearts in the Highlands

by timetiger



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/M, Loch Ness Monster, M/M, Scotland
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-28
Updated: 2018-10-28
Packaged: 2019-08-08 23:40:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,744
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16439060
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/timetiger/pseuds/timetiger
Summary: Remus Lupin and Severus Snape open a bed and breakfast not far from Loch Ness.





	Hearts in the Highlands

Hearts in the Highlands

 

“That family from Chicago. Precisely how long do they intend staying with us?” Severus Snape made a prodding gesture with his wand as he urged the scrub brush into the corners of the kitchen floor. “I’ve never seen three people with so many suitcases. I thought at first they must be on the lam.”

 

Remus Lupin glanced up from his shopping list. “Don’t people on the lam tend to travel light?” 

 

Severus snorted and set a sponge to scouring the worktop. 

 

“They’re leaving day after tomorrow,” Remus added, “but why should their luggage concern you? ”

 

“Because you were off plunging toilets when they arrived and they expected me to help them carry the lot up three flights of stairs,” said Severus.

 

“If I’d I known you preferred . . .” Remus began.

 

“Because they’re certain to leave something behind, and someone” -- Severus looked pointedly at Remus -- “is going to have to pack it up and send it off after them.”

 

Remus shrugged. “Well, these things . . .”

 

“Because it’s distasteful.” Severus wrinkled his not insubstantial nose.

 

Remus peered into the fridge, then added black pudding and haggis -- both standard and organic vegetarian -- to the list. “Distasteful, Severus? They probably heard one too many stories about our weather and wanted to be prepared. You know, snowshoes and Speedos. Woolly socks and, I don’t know. Parasols.” 

 

“They made tea in the kettle.” Turning out the room that afternoon Severus had found half an inch of brownish grey mess stagnating at the bottom of one of the small electric kettles they provided to their guests. 

 

“That is disgusting,” admitted Remus. He folded the shopping list twice and tucked it into a shirt pocket. “Perhaps Chicagoans don’t as a rule encounter tea.”

 

“Ludicrous werewolf.” Severus performed a cleansing spell on the scrub brush, the rag, and the sponge. “I’ll concede that our bank account is looking healthy,” he said. “When you suggested we turn your late grandfather’s house in the Highlands into an eight-room bed and breakfast establishment it did occur to me to question your judgment.”

 

Remus nodded. “Yes, I recall you had certain reservations. In fact, you very nearly hexed me.”

 

Severus appeared not to have heard him. “But your business plan seemed sound, and Drumnadrochit has proved as popular with tourists as you said it was. I’d no idea Muggles cared about visiting castles and searching for monsters.”

 

Remus grinned. “What’s more, you’ll thank me as the days grow short and the tourists start thinning out. By mid-November we’ll be able to close for the season. It’ll be just the two of us then, Severus, and we can read and write and brew -- that is, you can brew,” he amended hastily -- “and I thought we might give mountaineering a try.”

 

“Very well,” said Severus, “and if the exchequer allows, we might consider a week in Spain.”

 

It was at that moment that sudsy water began dripping through the ceiling. As Remus went rushing up the stairs, Severus called after him. “Perhaps Chicagoans don’t as a rule encounter bathtubs, either!”

 

Shortly after midnight, Severus and Remus lay stretched out, not quite dozing, on their private verandah. They were still dressed for the day, and their corduroy jackets felt good against the night air. The sky was light, in the manner of June skies across the far north of the world. A fluttering shape appeared and hovered near their heads. They had their wands out before their eyes had a chance to focus.

 

When he could see their visitor clearly, Remus returned his wand to his sleeve. “Severus, it’s a flying fish.”

 

“I can see that.” Severus snapped with his wand still held high. “What does the fish want?” 

 

“Look, he has a little scroll tucked beneath one fin.” Remus gently removed the scroll, which was made of trout vellum. “Oh my,” he said on reading it. “Oh Merlin’s macassar oil.”

 

By now the fish was flapping excitedly and orbiting their heads.

 

Wizarding Gentlemen, Remus read. Your presence in Loch Ness is -- is that requested or required? -- at your earliest convenience.

 

“In the Loch?” Severus asked. “I think not.”

 

Another line of the message became visible. It would be counted a very great favor.

 

“Well, if the fish puts it like that,” said Severus, putting his wand away and pretending to go to sleep. 

 

“The fish is evidently just the messenger,” said Remus, as an elaborate signature formed. “I don’t suppose I have any fish treats about me,” he added to himself, rummaging in his pockets all the same.

 

Under a shimmering sky, they followed the fish to the shores of Loch Ness. Each prepared a charm for underwater breathing, and then they entered the chilly waters. All at once they found themselves descending in a warm clear column. 

 

“After this,” Remus told himself, “I shall think nothing of falling downstairs.” 

 

Then he and Severus were standing on the floor of the Loch, and a grey-green plesiosaur approximately the size of an African elephant was bending her long and curving neck to inspect them. Her horns were like those of a giraffe.

 

“Wizards taking up residence on the shores of my Loch!” the plesiosaur exclaimed. Her voice was like the cry of curlews and the bellowing of cattle and they could hear her clearly in spite of being two hundred meters underwater.

 

Remus smiled. “It’s a lovely part of the world, you see, and very popular with tourists.” 

 

“I know all about that,” said the plesiosaur. 

 

“It makes a livelihood for us, ma’am,” said Severus, in unexpectedly conciliatory tones. 

 

“Well, it’s a nuisance for me,” came the retort. “And growing worse by the day.“

 

“I’m not sure I follow you, ma’am,” put in Remus, trying to follow Severus’s lead.

 

“It’s the technology isn’t it?” asked Severus sympathetically.

 

The plesiosaur inclined her great head toward him. “They’re getting far too close for comfort, with their scopes and their sonar and their submersibles and things. Time was, I could come up to fish for salmon or sun myself whenever I liked, and if every few decades or so someone happened to catch a glimpse . . . well, it gave them a bit of a thrill and added to the local colour and what was the harm in that?”

 

“You enjoyed baiting them, you mean,” said Remus.

 

“How many have you eaten?” asked Severus.

 

“We seem to be wandering from the topic,” said the plesiosaur. “In any event, I’m accustomed to spending most of my time quite cosily asleep down here. But lately it’s become exhausting keeping one step ahead of the trespassers. I never know when a camera or a sensor or a satellite is going to find me out.” She looked into the middle distance over Severus’s right shoulder and assumed an expression of nonchalance. “And so I was wondering if, being wizards and all, you might be willing to help out a fellow magical creature.”

 

“We couldn’t do anything right away,“ said Severus, “but a venerable person such as yourself no doubt reckons time rather differently than we do.”

 

“What Severus means,” said Remus, “is that just now we’re run off our feet with the tourists.”

 

“You could do something about that,” suggested Severus. “We have a family staying with us right now who are, I’ve noticed, all rather portly and slow-moving. Why don’t I recommend they visit a certain scenic spot by the water’s edge? I could pack them a picnic.”

 

“Which is to say that once late autumn sets in we’ll be able to work on a way to help you,” said Remus.

 

“I could move house, of course,” said the plesiosaur thoughtfully. “I have family under the South Polar Ice Cap and they’ve often invited me to live with them. Once every millennium or so, you know how it is. But somehow, I don’t care to leave the Highlands.”

 

“We won’t let it come to that,” Remus promised. 

 

They returned home in the small hours of the morning, and Remus looked out their bedroom window. “Two o’clock and there’s still that strange light in the air. What do they call it in St. Petersburg? White nights. Don’t you love them?”

 

Severus groaned and magicked his dressing gown over the skylight. “We’ll be getting up in four hours.“

 

“There’s that MacFall fellow, the guest from Dunfermline -- or is it Dumfries?”

 

“Unless by ‘there’ you mean in our en suite I don’t care,” Severus said, his voice muffled.

 

Now where would he have been wandering at this time of night? Remus wondered silently as he doused the lamp.

 

By the end of October the house stood half empty. One guest was a quietly cheerful woman from just outside Glasgow who had decided it was time to scatter her husband’s ashes in the glen. Another was the returning Douglas MacFall -- from Dumbarton, as it happened. An avid outdoorsman, fond of fly fishing and windsurfing and golf, he had the odd habit of sleeping in and setting off in early afternoon, returning long after everyone else had gone to bed. There was also a young couple from Toronto.

 

“More bagpipers?” Severus had asked when Remus mentioned this last booking. “Tell them there’s been a mistake and we’re overbooked. Tell them we’re playing host to a convention of poltergeists. Tell them we’ve been burnt to the ground. Best be on the safe side -- tell them all three.”

 

“They said they wanted to hike and take pictures,” Remus had told him. “They didn’t say a word about bagpipes.” 

 

“They never do,” Severus mused, “and yet sixty-six per cent of our Canadian guests have been pipers. It must be a form of mania. Naturally, I could use a muffling charm, or transform their instruments into -- I don’t know, violas. Or now that I have a bit of spare time, I might brew the potion that makes utter silence more precious than rubies. It’s troublesome and malodorous, but so worth it. Of course, I could take the simple approach and Obliviate them. Make them entirely forget what a bagpipe is.”

 

“Severus, leave the Canadians -- and their fictive bagpipes -- alone. And speaking of things, we did make a promise.”

 

“Yes, I was about to raise that very point before you set off on your tangent.” 

 

Remus counted silently to ten. 

 

In the run-up to Christmas, with all the guests gone home at last, the two spent nearly every waking moment experimenting with incantations, spells, potions, and amulets. Exotic ingredients -- pacarana milk, sloth butter, and Roswellian oysters, among them -- were ordered from three continents. Magical databases were pored over and books borrowed from Hogwarts as well as the Wizarding sections of the National Library of Scotland, the British Library, and the Bibliothèque nationale de France. Fire calls were made to a trustworthy cryptozoologist witch in Vancouver and her equally tight-lipped colleague in Mumbai. Finally, on December twenty-first, Remus and Severus were satisfied and set off for the Loch.

 

Exactly seventeen feet from the place where they’d entered the water in June, they paused. “Rawky, roaky, reeky, rauch,” Severus pronounced, adding a dab of German to his gran’s Yorkshire dialect. A slow mist enveloped them and began to spread out over the water. Once their presence was fully obscured, they again prepared their charms for underwater breathing, walked forward, and began their descent.

 

Nessie was waiting for them. 

 

After the briefest of polite greetings, Severus cleared his throat. “We’ve tested concealment potions and obscuration charms of every variety, singly and in concert. We’ve tinkered about with camouflage enchantments and invisibility auras. We even dabbled for an hour or so with a time-shifting spell.”

 

“Which was a very foolish thing to do,” put in Remus. 

 

“No joy,” said Severus. “Your magic and ours are insufficiently compatible.” He allowed this to sink in.

 

“In the end,” Remus said after a judicious pause, “the solution we came up with is one that will allow you to transform at will into a human being.” 

 

Nessie opened her mouth very wide. Her many teeth were pointed and gleaming and improbably white. Her eyebrows -- which they had not noticed before -- climbed right up to the top of her head. Then she compressed her lips and was silent for a very long time. Finally her expression softened. “You’re certain you can’t do me a shield or a defensive screen of some sort? A cloaking device?”

 

Remus and Severus shook their heads.

 

“Distorting my person seems so extreme,” said Nessie.

 

“Think of it as a new way to express yourself,” said Severus.

 

Remus traced signs in the air around her head and flippers while Severus anointed her. “Let the potion drizzle along your epidermis, that’s right,” said Severus, breaking off his chanting for a moment. Nessie held herself rigid throughout the ceremony, alternating between peering at the two wizards anxiously and squeezing her eyes tight shut. 

 

“There, now, all done with our part,” said Remus, after precisely thirty-seven and two thirds minutes had passed. 

 

“I don’t feel any different,” said Nessie. “Shouldn’t I have knees and hair and hips and such?” 

 

“That’s where your efforts come in,” explained Severus. “Unless, that is, you prefer to deal in your own way with trespassers and sneaks.” 

 

“We’ve been all through that,” said Nessie. “What must I do?”

 

Remus and Severus explained the particulars of her role in the proceedings, and she proved a quick study. As soon as she was letter perfect in word and gesture, the water around them began to froth and swish and taste of oatcakes. Then it turned a violent shade of mauve. Lastly, it formed a geyser and shot the three of them onto the banks of the Loch -- Remus, Severus, and a tall woman who looked to be the same age as themselves, with red hair going sandy and a Highlander’s clear blue eyes. She was wearing Harris tweed.

 

“Rawky, roaky, reeky, rauch,” said Severus quickly, calling up a thick mist. “Your comings and goings had best be concealed,” he explained and quickly taught her the spell. 

 

“I want my tea,” said Nessie, and followed them home.

 

Two hours later, Severus and Remus were settled beside their own fire, each with a glass of Drambuie in his hand. Nessie’s appetite had been of the normal human variety, much to their relief, and she’d been delighted to discover smoked salmon on buttered brown bread. She’d thanked them heartily and -- a warm fruit scone and some raspberry jam later -- departed for the Loch. 

 

“Seville or Barcelona?” asked Remus, guiding more kindling onto the fire with his wand. 

 

Severus tossed him a multi-coloured brochure showcasing Thailand’s only wizarding island.

 

Not long after the start of the new year, Remus and Severus strolled along a powdery white beach under a sky of unbroken sapphire. Remus summoned a dish of ginger and green tea ice cream. “This is really good,” he said, slurping enthusiastically.

 

“Gluttonous werewolf. You’ve been averaging three of those a day since we arrived,” said Severus.

 

“You’ve shown a fondness for the local cuisine yourself,” said Remus. He licked the spoon. “I wonder if there’s any way we might burn off the extra calories.”

 

Severus smirked. He summoned a flying beach blanket which floated them to a secluded stand of flowering shrubs. The fragrant white blossoms chimed like tiny bells. Remus lay down, closed his eyes, and sighed with happiness and anticipation.

 

“It’s that fish again,” Severus announced through gritted teeth.

 

Eyes still shut, Remus snuggled into the sun-warmed blanket. “Hmmm? Which fish?” he asked sleepily. “We’ve met so many, and all the lovely Merpeople, and that superb sea star. How would you even begin to describe such a colour?”

 

“You’d better speak to it,” said Severus.

 

Remus opened his eyes and sat up. “Hello, Fergus,” he said, slipping the scroll from under a pectoral fin.

 

“What does the reptile woman want now?” Severus demanded.

 

“She says that Douglas MacFall -- from Dunkeld, wasn’t it? -- is back,” Remus said, reading the scroll. “He’s staying at a self-catering cottage in Lewiston.” 

 

“Don’t tell me,” said Severus, interested in spite of himself. “Is it night skiing this time?” 

 

“Rather worse than that I’m afraid,” replied Remus.

 

“Night jetskiing? Idiotic, but what does she expect us to do about it?” Severus asked. 

 

“Severus, listen. It turns out that MacFall’s late-night sportsmanship was a cover. He’s revealed himself as a Nessie hunter and a dedicated one. That’s what was in his golf bag and his rucksack and his fly box and so on. The very latest in monster-hunter nanotechnology. No submarine required.”

 

Severus lay back and flung an arm across his face. “Well, she has but to transform.” 

 

“Yes, of course, but he’s not just investigating the waters. He’s taken to showing up whenever she happens to be in human form, too. Just yesterday she was having a quiet bowl of cullen skink and a glass of Crabbie’s down at the Kelpie Inn, and there he was. The day before, she was doing a bit of hill walking -- I suppose it must make a nice change for her -- and there on the path was that pestiferous MacFall.”

 

“Why doesn’t she just transform back and eat him?” Severus asked, his voice muffled by a sleeve.

 

“I’m afraid we haven’t much choice but to cut our holiday short,” said Remus.

 

“Of course we have a choice. What’s the matter with everybody? She’s house-sitting for us. Let her sit in the house. Let MacFall engage in the life aquatic and, if there’s any justice -- frost-bitten -- while he indulges his obsession. The twain need never meet.”

 

“She has to go out to buy food,” said Remus. “It’s not as if she can send Fergus.” The little fish flapped at them. “And what if MacFall should break in? We didn’t bother putting up wards because the Highlands are usually so safe.”

 

There followed a long silence. “Severus, how can you have fallen asleep?” 

 

Severus sighed and sat up. “If we leave now, we can be home in time for Burns Night,” he said.

 

“That’s the spirit!” 

 

“And you’ll let me Obliviate him?” asked Severus.

 

“You know how much I hate that spell,” said Remus, “but this time I don’t see there’s any alternative.”

 

At the end of a very long journey, one which began with a mix-up concerning portkeys and was not improved by a glitch involving brooms, Remus and Severus arrived home. Weary and travel-sore, chilled nearly to the marrow, they opened the front door. A fire blazing and crackling in the parlour grate met them with the comforting smell of applewood. It would have been most welcome, but there sprawled on the ancient Persian rug in front of it was Douglas MacFall. He was wearing a tartan dressing gown and enjoying a cheese toastie. 

 

MacFall stumbled to his feet, which were bare. “You’re probably wondering why I’m here,” he blurted. “I was invited! I’m no squatter, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

 

“Where is she?” Remus snarled. Severus already had his wand at MacFall’s throat.

 

“Elspeth?” MacFall squeaked. “She’s repairing the drains. We were taking a shower -- I mean, I was, just me, on my own -- and, well, the pipes here really are a disaster . . . “ He winced, not having intended to be so blunt. “That is, they can use a little help, so being a master plumber -- you knew that, right? -- of course you did, she’s your house sitter -- she said she’d attend to them.”

 

“Why are you naked? No, don’t bother to answer that.” Severus put his wand away disgustedly. 

 

MacFall clutched at his gown, which had fallen open, dropping the cheese toastie on the rug in the process.

 

Just then “Elspeth” came down the stairs, her long sandy hair tied back and the sleeves of her frothy white nightdress rolled up in businesslike fashion. 

 

“We’ve returned early, as you see,” said Remus evenly.

 

“Yes, and I do thank you for that,” said their house-sitter. “But I’ve sorted the matter I contacted you about. I’ve sorted the drains, too. It was only a matter of time before your ceiling fell.” 

 

“Elspeth is so talented,” MacFall went on. “Did you know about her background in marine biology?”

 

“Freshwater biology, actually,” she said modestly.

 

Remus sighed. “I’m for bed,” he said.

 

“I made up your room,” said Elspeth/Nessie.

 

“We’re all so fortunate to have a gem like Elspeth in our lives.” MacFall said, taking her hand as she sidled closer. “Before I met her, my life was incomplete. I knew I was missing something -- I just didn’t know what it was. Can you believe I thought I could make a name for myself by finding the great Loch Ness Monster?” He laughed ruefully. “I must have been delusional.”

 

“How so?” asked Severus sharply. 

 

“Don’t you see?” asked MacFall. “One minute I’m Monster-hunting, the next I’m in love. Life is full of mystery.”

 

“So you’re no longer interested in being a Nessie hunter?” asked Severus.

 

“Oh, no,” replied MacFall. “I think the Monster should be left in peace -- that is, if it does exist. I hope we never find out. I only know that I wanted to have something magical in my life. Now I do.”

 

Remus watched Severus turn on his heel and go up the stairs.

 

A few minutes later, Remus followed him to their room. A basket filled with chocolate frogs and Severus’s favorite ginger nuts stood next to the Daily Prophet on the nightstand. The sheets smelled beguilingly of lavender.

 

“Just how long are those two planning to stay with us?” asked Severus, lying back among the pillows. 

 

“It mightn’t be a bad idea to have a plumber on staff,” Remus mused. “And evidently MacFall does know a thing or two about fishing and windsurfing. We could probably attract a few more guests if we were to hire him on as a guide in season.”

 

Severus leaned up on an elbow and looked at him. “He’ll need to be caretaker and gardener and porter, as well, if he expects to stay here.”

 

Remus doused the lamp. “Fair enough. Of course, more guests would mean more income and longer holidays for us.” 

 

Severus nodded. “We might magically expand the old garage into a small apartment for them. That is, if she can distract him long enough.”

 

“I've no doubt she can manage it.” Remus turned in Severus’s arms. “Enough, though, about their happy-ever-aftering. It’s high time we attended to our own.”

 

“Soppy werewolf,” said Severus. “Perhaps you’d care to remind me where were we when that ridiculous fish last interrupted us.”


End file.
